


Probable-Possible

by Lokei



Category: Fantastic Four (Movieverse)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-25
Updated: 2007-03-25
Packaged: 2017-10-19 02:24:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/195806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lokei/pseuds/Lokei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You never leave your college town behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Probable-Possible

Reed had liked college, and graduate school, and his doctoral program.The MIT campus, and Cambridge in general, were places where one could walk into a cheap hamburger joint and overhear conversations on the psychological and sociological implications of theme songs on a modern political campaign, or spy someone working out an algorithm on a napkin, or indulge in a hearty game of ‘What If’ over a pitcher of inexpensive beer.

Even in college, however, Reed had a tendency to stick out.In a game of ‘What If’ where others at the table would try to come up with the most outlandish yet plausible sounding outcomes for a given situation—the Red Sox win the World Series—the man elected President actually gets to be President—someone hacks the Pentagon mainframe—Reed’s what ifs were a little off the beaten track, even for MIT.

One night, pre-Sue, one of Reed’s lab partners had brought along a Harvard girl he’d wanted to impress to one of their weekly gatherings, and had then proceeded to bore her so thoroughly with an elegiac to swarm behavior in insects which held keys to designing artificial intelligence that even Reed noticed her eyes glazing over.And Reed noticed enough to know he didn’t usually notice that sort of thing, which meant the situation must be dire.

So Reed proposed a game of ‘What If’ to change the pace and save Tim from himself and her from Tim.When it came his turn, Reed posited the discovery of a new Shakespeare play, since nothing like it had come up in the group before.Her eyes had lit up like someone had turned on a switch, and they had promptly left the rest of the table in their conversational dust, discussing methods of authenticating the document, from handwriting to language analysis programs to tracing source material.Eventually it grew even to a discussion that all geniuses, literary or otherwise, to some extent are reshaping the ideas and understandings of a previous generation.

Apparently, she had been an English major.

Which had meant Reedwas a genius by accident this time.

Reed thinks he still has the paper with her number on it in one of his files.And so when he finds himself abandoning his most recent equation to doodle Queen Elizabeth I looking like Ben post-mutation (and really, a complexion like that would explain that heavy makeup and ruff), he just smiles.

And when Sue plops herself down in his lap uninvited with a pert ‘Thinking of me?’ he keeps the smile, stretching a finger to slide the doodle into his pile of notes and imagining the progress of the English Civil War if King Charles had avoided execution by being too bendy to behead.

Because Sue might be the Invisible Girl, but there’s more to Reed than meets the eye.


End file.
